Rediscovery and Expectations

Richard’s story continues in the 21st century with the exhumation of his skeleton in Leicester, and the many unanswered questions raised by the project.

The conduct of the affairs related to the exhumation & reburial of this King of England have led to many questions that have been ignored by the establishment.

How did the ‘Looking for Richard’ group (LFR) manage to organize an archaeological project with the specific aim of discovering King Richard’s remains, with no transparent oversight on behalf of the nation and no one designated to represent King Richard’s own interests?

Why was Leicester City Council allowed to insist that the remains be reinterred in Leicester as a condition of granting permission for the “dig”?

How is it that the Church of England was allowed to effectively decide that the use of King Richard’s remains as a relic as a tourist attraction was more important than observing the inferred wishes of the deceased regarding the site of his burial?

Why did the exhumation license, that clearly stated the intention to disinter the remains of a King of England, receive only routine processing through the Ministry of Justice, with apparently no questions asked?

How was it that after the official identification of the remains as those of King Richard III, there was no further consideration of the appropriateness of the planned reinterment, which disregarded the best information available as to the identified individual’s wishes regarding his place of burial?

Why did the Judicial Review, that opened the door in its initial session to consider the wider issues raised by this whole affair, decide to stay with the narrowest possible interpretation of the legality of the issued?

Why was no protection offered for these particular royal remains, from the level of invasive testing planned by the University of Leicester? Other royal remains are protected in burial sites within abbeys and churches, and permission is unlikely to be granted for them to be treated as scientific specimens.

How is it that the university which took possession of the remains from an independent entity (ULAS), which was hired to perform the archaeological dig by a private entity (LFR), allowed free reign to perform whatever testing it wished and could have legally, as initially proposed, chosen to display the remains in a local museum?

Why was the university permitted to provide its own ethical review of the plans regarding the remains when it was the one that stood to benefit from the research and tests to be performed?

How is it that the planning of the reinterment was left entirely to the discretion of local entities in Leicester, without involvement by the Earl Marshall* and others that usually plan royal ceremonials?

Why was the reinterment ceremony conducted according to the rites of the Anglican church instead of according to King Richard’s own faith?

Why were those involved in the reinterment week events allowed to show so little respect for the deceased as to repeat the lazy historians’ attitudes based on the repudiated work of Sir Thomas More & other Tudor propagandists?

How is it that the press remained complacent throughout, simply regurgitating the press releases of the mainstream entities involved, never bothering to really look below the surface?

*The Earl Marshal (by hereditary right since Richard's time incidentally, the current Duke of Norfolk) always handles royal funerals and is the sine qua non arbiter of state occasion and ceremonial, as has always been his duty.

His non-involvement (regardless of his personal inclinations in the matter) can be taken as an unequivocal message from Her Majesty that, as far as she was concerned, Richard III was not to be regarded as anything but a traitor and an usurper, never as a sovereign. In fact the royal website still labels him as such, despite the known fact that he became king legally, after accepting the title when it was offered to him by the three estates of the realm, the Lords Temporal and Spiritual, as well as the commons.

The above matters cover just some of the injustices occurring in regards to the discovery and reinterment of King Richard. There are so many other issues that have arisen during, and after, his discovery and reinterment, including the continual use of images obtained while the late king was being examined in a lab, the nature of how his remains’ presence is exploited for both monetary and personal gain, and the continual disrespect shown.

It is important that as time passes, these issues are not forgotten, as the late king still deserves the true respect owed to him. We hope that in the future we will be able to right some of these wrongs and put a stop to the continual vampiric use of his remains as they lie in Leicester.